Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for the opportunity to testify at
this important hearing on behalf of USAID. As you know Assistant
Administrator Adolfo Franco wishes he could be here today. These are
historic times, when many millions of people in another part of the
world -- long subject to dictatorship - have begun to taste the fruits
of freedom.
However, the Cuban people are not yet free. The latest Castro
regime atrocities against the Cuban people - the mass arrests and
summary executions -- have awakened the consciousness of free people
everywhere. One hundred peaceful Cuban citizens with courageous
conviction that freedom of thought and expression are fundamental
human rights have been charged as a threat to the regime. Seventy-five
now face extended prison terms, while three others who sought a better
life elsewhere were executed by a firing squad at dawn. The Castro
regime defended these barbaric measures as necessary to protect
national security.
President George Bush, Secretary of State Colin Powell, USAID
Administrator Andrew Natsios, the U.S. Chief of Mission in Havana, Jim
Cason, and scores of US political luminaries have all denounced, in
the strongest terms, these outrageous actions.
The European Union, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch,
international labor unions, Nobel Prize laureates, and newspapers
around the world have joined their voices in collective denunciation.
But denunciations are not enough. As President Bush has said, we
must greatly increase our efforts to promote a rapid, peaceful
transition to democracy in Cuba. The U.S. Agency for International
Development (USAID), through its Cuba Program, pledges increased
effort and support to these vital voices of freedom.
Authorized by Section 109 of the Cuban Liberty and Democratic
Solidarity (LIBERTAD) Act of 1996, USAID has funded action programs --
by U.S. universities and non-governmental organizations -- to build
solidarity with Cuba's human rights activists, give voice to Cuba's
independent journalists, help develop Cuba's independent libraries,
defend the rights of Cuban workers, and provide direct outreach to the
Cuban people. These programs are overt and transparent, as witnessed
by our presence here today.
Since our first grant to Freedom House in the summer of 1996, USAID
has taken seriously the charge to promote a peaceful transition to
democracy in Cuba, by increasing the flow of accurate information on
democracy, human rights, and free enterprise to, from, and within the
island. These programs give voice and strength to the repressed and
provide moral support to the courageous.
On May 20th of last year, President Bush announced his Initiative
for a New Cuba. The President said, "Our plan is to accelerate
freedom's progress in Cuba in every way possible, just as the United
States and our democratic friends and allies did successfully in
places like Poland, or in South Africa…." The President also said "Our
government will offer scholarships in the United States for Cuban
students and professionals who try to build independent civil
institutions in Cuba, and scholarships for family members of political
prisoners…."
USAID is proud to be part of this effort. Just as we did in Poland,
Hungary, Czechoslovakia, South Africa, Chile, Nicaragua and elsewhere
-- we will strengthen our current efforts in support of Cuba's human
rights activists, independent journalists, independent librarians,
independent labor unions, and to bring hope and information to the
Cuban people. We also have designed a scholarship program to make real
the President's vision for providing an educational leg-up for Cubans,
as articulated in his Initiative for a New Cuba. We will be announcing
that program in the coming weeks.
Over the past seven years, Cuba's human rights activists have
developed national and international level networks to press the Cuban
regime for democratic change. The Castro regime's latest crackdown,
imprisoning scores of these activists, sought to silence the growing
call for change. But the regime can not silence the Cuban people,
because thousands of new voices throughout the Island now call for
democratic change, and their numbers are increasing every day.
USAID pledges to redouble our effort to build solidarity with
Cuba's human rights activists -- responding with alacrity to their
requests for books, videos, short-wave radios, and other means of
information and communication. Since 1997, USAID grantees have worked
with solidarity committees around the world to call for international
support for Cuba's peaceful activists. USAID has also provided more
than 120,000 pounds of food and medicine to the families of political
prisoners and other victims of repression inside Cuba. We will strive
to increase this support. For accepting this humanitarian assistance
(food and medicine) people deprived of jobs, income and medical care
are called by the Cuban government "the paid agents of imperialism."
Contrary to the Cuban government's allegations, USAID is not providing
cash payments to any activists, persons or organizations within Cuba.
The Castro regime last month imprisoned dozens of independent
journalists. But many will still find ways to send to the outside
world their reports of deteriorating economic conditions, human rights
violations and the conditions inside Cuba's prisons, and many others
will report from elsewhere on that imprisoned island. No one believes
that imprisonment will silence the voices of Raul Rivero and other
brave Cuban independent journalists. Over the past several years,
USAID grantees have published via the internet more than 18,000
articles by Cuba's independent journalists. We will increase our
efforts to publish their reports, and to distribute them in hard copy
on the island. And we will continue to provide Cuba's independent
journalists with the books, videos, training materials, and other
information they request.
The Castro regime has imprisoned many independent librarians, for
the alleged "crime" of lending books to their neighbors. Books by
Martin Luther King, Vaclev Havel, Jose Marti, and other alleged
"subversives" are the evidence. USAID has provided Cuba's independent
libraries and the Cuban people directly with more than 1.7 million
books, brochures, newsletters and other informational materials. We
will increase this flow of information to the growing numbers of
independent libraries throughout Cuba, and we will especially increase
the circulation inside the Island by independent Cuban writers.
The Castro regime has also imprisoned independent Cuban labor
leaders. USAID will continue to work with free unions world-wide to
put pressure on the Cuban government to respect workers' rights, and
to allow the development of independent unions inside Cuba.
The Castro regime has confiscated books, newsletters, video
cassettes, video recorders, laptop computers, short-wave radios and
other materials the Cuban people need to obtain independent
information. However, this will not deter courageous Cubans from
expressing independent points of view nor will it dissuade USAID from
increasing its outreach efforts to the Cuban people. On the contrary,
USAID will increase its programs of outreach to the Cuban people, to
provide them with more books, videos, and short-wave radios with which
they can listen to international radio broadcasts from around the
world, including Voice of America, Radio Marti, the BBC, and Radio
Netherlands. USAID has already provided the Cuban people with more
than 7,000 short-wave radios. The Cuban government has denounced this
as a "violation of Cuban national sovereignty" and as "introduction of
contraband." Why is the regime afraid of a short-wave radio? What does
it want to hide from the Cuban people?
The actions of the Castro regime this past month, as well as over
the past decade, show they are desperate and afraid, and choose to
resort to practices and punishments unacceptable to civilized people
in this century. But the Castro regime is gradually losing its grip on
the Cuban people. Some day soon, this regime will end. It will end,
because the Cuban people will, with a united voice, demand democratic
change.
We pledge to increase our efforts to promote that change, as
rapidly and as peacefully as the future permits. Thank you for this
opportunity and I know that news of the support of this Congress will
somehow penetrate Castro's prison walls and reach those who deserve it
most.
Mr. Chairman, with that I conclude my testimony and am pleased to
answer any questions that you and other Committee Members may have
this afternoon.
Thank you
